Most people are at least a little apprehensive when boarding an airplane, but just how concerned should we all be? What’s more dangerous than getting on an airplane?

According to the National Safety Council’s data on accidents, the lifetime odds of dying from an injury are 1 in 24. There are many ways of suffering from accidental injury, from being bitten by a venomous spider (1 in 716,000) to suffocating in bed (1 in 11,000). Herewith is a list of ten activities, in increasing order of danger, that present a greater threat of death than traveling by air, based on lifetime odds:

• Drowning in natural water (1.5 times more dangerous than air travel);
• Falling down a flight of stairs (1.7 times more dangerous);
• Being poisoned (3.3 times more dangerous);
• Killed on a motorcycle (3.5 times more dangerous);
• Dying in a building fire (3.7 times more dangerous);
• Suffocating on an injested non-food object (4 times more dangerous);
• Dying in a pickup truck or van crash (4.2 times more dangerous);
• Being killed while crossing a street (7.5 times more dangerous);
• Overdosing on narcotics (8 times more dangerous); and, no surprise;
• Dying in a car crash (19 times more dangerous than traveling by air).

We’ve all heard that the car trip to the airport is more dangerous than the plane trip, but how many realize it is almost 20 times more dangerous, or that crossing the street to the air terminal is almost 8 times more dangerous?

Fortune Magazine is back at it with another list to capture the collective mindset on which companies are the most admired. “Most admired” falls closely in line with being profitable, as you might imagine, but not always.  Other key factors in getting the nod included respect for the product, service quality and innovation.

Apple, with its legion of devoted followers, not surprisingly, ranked number one.  It was followed in second place by Google, which I personally could not live without.  Ironically, Toyota, in the midst of its brand meltdown due to safety concerns over sudden acceleration in its vehicles, made the top 10, coming in at number seven.  Also in the top ten, Berkshire Hathaway, Johnson & Johnson, Amazon.com, Proctor & Gamble, Goldman Sachs, Wal-Mart, and Coca-Cola.

To come up with the list, Fortune’s survey asked businesspeople to vote for the companies they admired most, from any industry.  Here’s a look at the list.  Click on each company to get a description of that company’s business status.

Top 50 most admired companies overall:

If you’re looking to buy a toothbrush, stay far far away from a hospital.  Imagine paying $1000 for ONE toothbrush. Perhaps we should call it an oral contaminant removal system, given the hefty price tag, but whatever you call it, it’s simply outrageous. And more importantly, it’s why American health care costs are skyrocketing. Click here for more.

The video above is a fantastic report by CNN’s Elizabeth Cohen, who exposes more of these ridiculously high charges for simple items on hospital bills.

Click here to see more health stories from CNN.

Eliminate the middle man and you pay less.  Everyone knows that.  So, once and for all, it’s time to save the taxypayers some money by removing private lenders from the process of writing government backed student loans.  It’s a concept the Obama administration has embraced and is pushing to make a reality.  Consumers would be much better off if they would just hurry up.

Time to Get it Done

It was one year ago that President Obama first unveiled a proposal to have the government take control of the federal student loan industry.  The plan was to eliminate the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP), in which private lenders service federal loans and rake in big bucks doing so.  A June 2009 analysis conducted by the Congressional Budget Office showed this switch could result in a savings of $87 billion in taxpayers money over the next ten years.

A Washington Post article in May 2009 noted, “for the past two decades, every attempt to overhaul the $85-billion-a-year student loan industry by eliminating subsidies to lenders has faced insurmountable opposition from one of the most powerful institutions in the business: Sallie Mae, the world’s largest student loan company.”

However, when President Obama unveiled his plan in 2009, Sallie Mae curiously didn’t come out full force against it.  In fact, Sallie Mae’s February 26, 2009, press release stated “We commend President Obama’s call to invest savings from low-cost federal funding sources to help students achieve their education goals.” Sallie Mae was “committed to delivering and servicing federal student loans regardless of the funding source.”

Get Giant Lenders Off Corporate Welfare

The plan seemed like a no-brainer.  Get giant lenders like Sallie Mae off corporate welfare and give money to students who need it.  The House of Representatives gave its approval by passing the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2009 on September 17, 2009, with a vote of 253-171.

But the tides have changed. Today, the student lending bill is stuck in the Senate. It is now vulnerable to revision, weakening and delay.  Even if it survives revision, there are doubts over whether the Senate will pass the bill any time soon.  Democratic support for the bill is weaning along with the many Republicans who have already expressed opposition.  So, what happened?

What Happened?

Let’s look at the timing of this. In February 2009, Sallie Mae, the source of the heaviest student loan lobbying of all time, was engaged in a bidding war over a government contract worth hundreds of millions of dollars.  The company was at risk of losing its lifeline– the servicing of federal student loans and the fees and subsidies that come along with that job.  Is not hard to see why Sallie Mae would stand behind any proposal made by the government while its very existence was in jeopardy.

Fast forward one year later.  Sallie Mae was awarded the highly sought-after servicing contract , and now the company’s tune has changed.  Although it claims its position has not wavered, the lending giant now insists “the President’s proposal could be enhanced in a way that preserves private sector competition. . .”

Saving Money for Whom?

Then came the “research” done by the private lenders, claiming they could also save the taxpayers’ money. This statement may come as a slap in the face, making one wonder, so you could have been saving us money all along but you just didn’t bother?  The Congressional Budget Office’s response to the private lenders’ proposal, known as the “Student Loan Community Proposal” was that it would take $13 billion of the estimated $87 billion of savings and put that money right into the private lenders’ pockets.

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan recently spoke out in support of student loan reform in a Wall Street Journal Op-Ed piece.  In that article, Duncan recounts that “For far too long, bankers have gotten a free ride from the U.S. Department of Education.”  Duncan goes on to state, “Sallie Mae, the largest player in the student lending business, has spent millions of dollars to lobby Congress and run ads in several states, claiming that our proposal will cost jobs and inhibit service.  These claims must be challenged.”  Secretary Duncan points out that “Sallie Mae sent thousands of American jobs overseas in 2007 to further increase profits, and it agreed to bring them back last year only to compete for our loan-servicing business.”  The Consumer Warning Network was the first to cover this chain of events in an April 2009 piece.

The future of the Bill at issue is unknown. If you have an opinion, contact your Senators and share your opinion!

The Consumer Warning Network has been examining loan sharking rates charged on consumer credit cards over the past few months. Recently, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart took a humorous look at Bank of America’s hidden credit card fees and The Mob. Click here to watch!

You can read more of our investigation in the related links below:

A glimmer of hope for consumers comes in the form of a couple of class action lawsuits filed by a Boston area law firm.  It may finally shake things up a bit.  Two lawsuits were filed this week in US District Court in Boston, which claim Wells Fargo and Bank of America have not followed federal rules for mortgage loan modifications, leaving some homeowners stuck in foreclosure “limbo.”  Click here to read more about the suits in the Boston Globe.

By Terry Smiljanich:

“He was a bold man that first ate an oyster,” so goes the famous quote by Jonathan Swift.

Oysters have been a food treat since prehistory, but everyone knows they can also be a threat.  Eating them raw can pose some risk.  A big enough risk that the FDA wants to do something about it. But then came politics, rearing its ugly head.

The Danger of Raw Oysters

Oysters harvested in warmer waters can harbor Vibrio vulnificus, a virulent “flesh-eating” bacterium which if ingested from raw oysters can kill you.  The mortality rate is as high as 50% among certain high risk patients, like those with liver problems or diabetes. This fact is the reason for the folk wisdom that one should only eat raw oysters in months that have an “R” in them (i.e., NOT in May, June, July or August, when ocean waters are generally at their warmest). In the Gulf of Mexico, where about two thirds of all American oysters are harvested, this is much more of a problem than oysters taken from Northern waters, such as prized Long Island Blue Points or West Coast Kumamotos.

How serious is a Vibrio infection? In 2008, 17 people died from this infection after consuming raw oysters. Given the fact that more than 60 million pounds of oysters are consumed per year in the United States, the chances of dying from eating a raw oyster are still pretty slim.

A Proposed Solution from the FDA

The deaths from Vibrio are preventable. Sterilization of harvested oysters during the dangerous summer months would all but eliminate the bacteria threat.

Last October, the Food and Drug Administration announced new proposed rules that would require “post-harvesting” processing of oysters taken from the Gulf of Mexico during the summer months to eliminate the threat of Vibrios.

Sterilization, however, is an expensive process, so the cost would obviously have a great effect on the price of oysters and when combined with decreased consumption would seriously undercut the profits made off of their sale.  Enter Politics.

Not So Fast, FDA

The oyster industry reacted quickly. Garnering support from Gulf Coast state and federal representatives, they put maximum pressure on the Obama Administration to back off of the proposed regulations.

Gulf Coast Senators went one step further. Legislation was introduced by Senators Bill Nelson (D-FL), Mary Landrieu (D-LA), and David Vitter (R-LA), the “Gulf Oyster Protection Act,” which would specifically “prohibit the implementation of any requirement for the control of Vibrio vulnificus applicable to the post-harvest processing of oysters.”

The result? Just one month later, the FDA announced that based on concerns as expressed by politicians and officials from the affected states (mainly Louisiana and Florida), the government decided it needed more time “to further examine both the the process and timing” for any changes in these new safety standards. The FDA will now “conduct an independent study to study how post-harvesting processing or other equivalent controls can be feasibly implemented in the Gulf Coast.”

Safety vs. Profits

The Center for Science in the Public Interest, which has been arguing for oyster safety standards for years, has organized a protest campaign.

It seems that there can and should be a legitimate cost/benefit analysis in weighing the pleasure of eating raw oysters, the dangers posed by that, and the steps that could be taken to eliminate the threat. But somehow it always seems that politics plays a more important role than any truly objective analysis.

The Detroit Free Press explainsToyota’s leading U.S. executive boasted to the automaker’s Washington staff last summer that they had saved the company more than $100 million by limiting regulatory action on sudden acceleration to a recall of equipment such as floor mats.  That is according to documents turned over to a key U.S. House committee which will hold the hearings beginning Tuesday.

The Wall Street Journal reports the claim was made in a presentation for Toyota executives titled “Wins for Toyota Safety Group.”  Among the “wins” the document lists are the savings claim, as well as a federal government “decision to close safety investigations of the Toyota Tacoma truck without ordering recalls, and delays to new safety rules that saved the company hundreds of millions of dollars.”  The presentation, the Journal speculates, “By linking safety issues to corporate profits, could prompt difficult questions for company executives, including President Akio Toyoda, who is scheduled to testify Wednesday before the Oversight Panel.”

The carmaker’s chief executive, Akio Toyoda, is set to testify before the oversight panel on Wednesday. The House Energy and Commerce Committee opens the round of hearings on Tuesday, while a Senate committee will meet on Toyota next week.

A new law that cracks down on credit card companies takes effect this week.  Issuers will no longer be allowed to retroactively hike your credit card interest rate, which, in turn, makes it easier for you to get out of debt.  Another result will be to make it tougher for college students to get credit cards.  Click here to watch a story from KTVN in Reno on how this will affect how students do business.

The new law is slated to save consumers billions in fees.  Credit card companies are also being forced to adopt better billing practices. You will get your bill at the same time each month and there will be no more midday cutoffs or due dates on weekends and holidays.  And the confusing double-billing cycle has been eliminated.  Click here for 5 things consumers need to know about these new rules.

Also, be aware that after the first year your account is open, a credit-card issuer can raise your interest rate at any time for any reason.  Click here to read more from CNN’s Gerri Willis.